Reflections on hell

We have been discussing hell a lot here, and I have been doing a bit of reading on the subject. Dave Smith and I (and Ginny) have had something of a back and forth on this (300 comments and rising!) and rather than leave everything in the comboxes, I thought I’d share some thoughts. Right up front, let me say I am not denying the reality of hell, but what I am doing is interrogating the view that it is a place where souls, or souls and bodies, burn for eternity.

So, let us have a little look at that four-letter word – hell. It is not used in the Greek or the Septuagint – so we do not find it anywhere in the original Bible. What do we find? We get four words (the links are to Strong’s concordance so you can check I am not making this up as I go along):

It depends, of course, on which English translation you use. The most common one, the King James Version, has the most uses of the word ‘hell’ – some 54 occurrences – you can see from the link that others have far fewer. To put it into perspective, the Bible uses the word ‘heaven’ 664 times – in whatever version you choose. It may mean nothing that in most versions heaven is mentioned more times, but in most modern versions ‘hell’ gets 14 mentions, and the original word is one of those used above. So where does this get us?

Let’s deal with ‘Tartarus’ first and its one mention in 2 Peter 2:4. This, we are told, is a holding place for fallen angels before they are judged – so I think we can say with some confidence it isn’t any place anyone is going to spend eternity. That leaves us with the other three words which the older English translations call ‘hell’.

In the Old Testament, every translation is from the Hebrew ‘Sheol’. It means the abode of the dead. I cannot trace any mention in the Jewish sources to which I have access of anyone burning there for eternity. In English, ‘Sheol’ is translated variously as ‘hell’, ‘the pit’ and ‘the grave’ – and it is a place people can go into when they are alive, but in which they then perish. It is a place of the dead – there is no mention of anyone in it having any consciousness – or of them burning. Hades is mentioned 11 times in the NT, mostly as hell, but once as grave. But what sort of place is it? If we look at Acts we see a place which looks like Sheol – a place where the dead go and their bodies rot.

The only word used in the NT which has any connotation of burning is Gehenna. It is used 12 times in the NASB: Matthew 5:22; Matthew 5:29; Matthew 5:30; Matthew 10:28; Matthew 18:9; Matthew 23:15; Matthew 23:33; Mark 9:43; Mark 9:45; Mark 9:47; Luke 12:5; James 3:6. Gehenna was a real place – it is the Hinnom valley just outside Jerusalem. It was the place where the Pagan Jews erected their altar to Moloch. As a result, later generations used it as a rubbish pit into which all the refuse of the city was thrown, and where the bodies of those crucified were also thrown – and fires would burn perpetually to burn the remains and stop germs spreading. So, when Jesus refers to it in Mark 9 as the place where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched he is speaking literally – those hearing him knew the place. There is no reference here to it being a place where any conscious being would dwell in eternal torment. Of course, for a Jew, the defilement of the corpse in such a place was a dreadful thing, and Christ is saying that even that would be better than sinning – but the idea that he is saying that those who sin are going to spend eternity suffering there is not in the text. If we look at the Lukan reference, where Jesus talks about ‘Him’ who destroys the body and soul in Gehenna, then that is a reference to God destroying us – not letting us live forever in torment.

Paul tells us the wages of sin is death, which he contrasts with the eternal life to those who believe. He does not say ‘the wages of sin is to burn in hell forever. Paul was steeped in Jewish teaching, and what he inherited was the idea of Sheol as a place of death and extinction. Psalm 1:6 told Paul and his fellow Jews that the Lord would know the righteous, but the ungodly would perish; it did not say they would burn in Gehenna. Psalm 37:20 made the same point – the wicked would perish, they would vanish away, and Psalm 69:28 underlines that – they will be ‘blotted out’ – not burnt in any lake of fire. They will be (Psalm 92:7) ‘destroyed forever’. This was standard Jewish teaching as we see not only from the Psalmists, but from Isaiah too. Malachai certainly mentions fire, but does so to say that the wicked will be burnt up and no trace of them will be left.

This was what the Jews believed, so if Jesus was telling them something new, one might expect much to have been made of this by Paul and the others – after all, if, as disobedience to God actually means spending eternity in a lake of fire, then that’s a message to get out there urgently, not least to the People of the Covenant who had no such concept. Yet we find St John, who certainly combatted heretical ideas in his Gospel and letters, telling us that those who do not believe in Jesus will perish, whilst those who do will have everlasting life; he does not say those who do not believe will burn in Gehenna. Paul makes the same point to the Philippians that the evil will be destroyed. The same message was sent to the Thessalonians (unless one takes the view that everlasting destruction does not mean that you are destroyed for evermore, but are subject to being destroyed for ever, and I can’t see why Paul would have meant that when there was no Jewish teaching to that effect) the Corinthians and, as I have already mentioned, to the Romans.

Paul seems to have known nothing of this Gehenna where the wicked would burn eternally, and neither he, nor James nor Jude nor Peter mention it. It would have been a big departure from what they had been taught, and one might reasonably have expected it to be emphasised. Instead there is a continuity with the Jewish teaching on Sheol. We shall be raised at the last and judged, and then, death and hell (Sheol) are cast into the lake of fire. They cease to exist, that is the second death.

How we read Revelation is always a moot point, and is one of the reasons the early Church fathers hesitated before accepting it into the Canon. ‘As late as 633, the Spanish Council of Toledo remarked how many people still opposed the use of John’s Revelation, and commanded that it must be read in church liturgies, under heavy penalty’, whilst to this day the Greeks do not use it in their liturgical worship. But it is there (although Luther had his doubts) and it tells us that hell and death are to be cast into the lake, as are those whose name is not written in the book of life, but only ‘the devil’ ‘the Beast’ and the ‘false prophet’ are condemned to eternal torment. One could certainly insist that everyone else in the lake would also suffer, but that would be a lot of weight to place on a notoriously difficult text.

Well, there it is, ‘heresy corner’ as Chalcedon has called it. I shall don my helmet and retire to my trenches with just one note. I am not denying the resurrection (pace ginny), neither am I saying hell is not real. I am simply trying to see how what the Scriptures say aligns with the Western belief that hell is a place of eternal torment. Yes, I am happier to think that God has so arranged things so that no one suffers for eternity; the faithless go down to the pit and are known no more; the faithful rise to life eternal.

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63 thoughts on “Reflections on hell”

Dearest Jess though this is interesting I am quick to think that this is llike two people reading the same poem and coming away with a different meaning. You have taken the minority view and every single text cited can be read in an entirely different way. That said, Christ sometimes referred to the torment of hell without ever using any of the words you describe: they were the allegorical parables that are the poems of NT scripture.

I have written a rather longish personal thought on one of these which I do not know if you want me to post in the comments or if I should upload it as a PDF to my own site and then link to it. Let me know what you would prefer.

C says that if you want, he can load it here. Might be useful I guess to have them both in the same place.

I agree with what you say. For me the question is what did Paul and the Jews believe? They do not seem to have believed that hell was a place of eternal burning torment. If the new revelation said that this was wrong, I think I’d have expected someone like Paul to have have said so.

See, I think that Paul did understand as the other Apostles heard Christ speak about these in parables and heard His other references personally.

As to the first death and second death; we have it that the first death is bodily death (the separation of the body from the soul). The second death is the (separation of the soul from God). At least this is what I have come to believe about how the texts were read.

The Jews, as said yesterday did not universally believe in heaven or hell in the way we do: but their idea of living eternally through their progeny and their ideas on sheol would have been read as typology that was revealed by Christ. So OT texts are not all that important in the context of what you are doing.

I shall send my text to C via gmail and he can divide this as he likes. 🙂

Yes do send it – he told me he was gmailing you. I am not disagreeing with that. I am saying the second death is the separation of the soul from God – but by extinction, not by burning it in any lake of fire.

I know Jess, and that would make of a God a craftsman that destroys his work if it didn’t please Him . . . and creating it whilst knowing it wouldn’t please him. A fickle God that didn’t mean to breathe into existencee a spirit soul which is eternal in its essence (a little lower than the angels).

But the same objection would apply in spades to the work of God’s hand burning eternally in a lake of fire, would it not? To sentence someone to that because they could not believe in him, would that not be a little egotistical?

If we chose to reject God, we reject life, and the wages of that is death. I can’t see anywhere where Paul endorses the idea of a Gehenna – but hey, what do I know? I should probably apologise now for my timing 🙂 xx

I just think we tend to humanize God a bit too much because of the human nature that Christ took upon Himself.

The wages of sin are death: a reference to the first sin of Adam which brought bodily death to man and a typology of the second death that sin causes in the separation of the soul from God for all eternity. A spirit soul is not that which dies . . . Satan is pure spirit and he and the other fallen angels will live eternally. You don’t seem to think there is a correspondence to our spirit souls.

Perhaps, and I see where you are coming from. But isn’t Paul contrasting death and eternal life in that passage? So, on one side, you die if you are an evil-doer, on the other you rise again and live forever if you are Godly? Or isn’t that it?

As I say, it is not how I read it and not how the bulk of Christianity has read. So, if you are right, the Church would teach it as theology or by tradition and it does not. I prefer to think of the vows I made to hold to all that the Church teaches on such matters. In that way, I do not have to question God’s Mercy or Love or think that this hell think is unmerciful and unloving. For I don’t see it in human terms but in the supernatural realm.

Yes, yes, we must submit to his will – in love and, I hope, through love. I think where I real problems is the idea of ‘fear’ being real fear and not ‘awe and reverence’. I couldn’t love a father of whom I was frightened. I could not help love my father whom I held in great awe and respect. I think it is around that that my problems come. I could fear someone who told me that if I was not good I would burn for ever, but I am not sure that could ever become love. I could be obedient, but not loving – does that make any sense?

Again you project your sentimental and ‘girly’ (God love you) emotions into the supernatural. I, personally, would probably die of fright as it was spoken of in the OT if I were to see God face to face. For to be presented in the beatific reality would be to see the power that makes a cosmos out of nothing . . . makes things come into existence and live and die. It is awesome. But it is Christ who, appearing as man, made it possible for us to look upon God without such fear. I guess what I am saying is that He can be both a Father and a Fearsome ALL in ALL which is not how God wants us to Love His Son. He wants us to love His Son as the Father Loves His Son. But if we don’t . . .

And thus the reality of Christ who came in a way that we could love and know that he would desire for us (all the souls in His Church) to be His Bride and thus children of His Father. And now we are capable of reaching out to Him with love and not quiver in fear at the mere mention of the word God.

Yes quite – maybe that was part of the season Paul was called as an apostle rather than the choice of a sadusee – They did not believe in the resurection of the dead and as my Sunday school teacher told me that id why they were sad-you-see!

Yes, I am more than happy to host another post. There is a school of thought on annihilationism, and I think some of what you have been quoting, Jess, belongs to it. As with much modern theologising, it does tend to assume that for much of the last two thousand years everyone else has got it wrong! The Orthodox position is more nuanced than I think you have indicated in some of your comments on the other thread. All of that said, it it good to be made to think, and you have done that. I shall see what Dave has to say before responding further.

Well done Jessica. Just for the record, I understand completely what you are saying, you have been completely clear from my perspective. Your question is whether God allows eternal torment in a lake of fire of the damned. From my understanding (which is extremely dim), eternal life has always and only applied to life with God in Heaven. This is the gift of faith: eternal life. The opposite of that is death that no longer has the hope of the companionship of God. In that sense, death is eternal, but it is death all the same, not life. So logically I have to say I agree with your reasoning. The fearful thing (which is a fear one might have of being burned alive, what could be more dreadful) is that we might be extinguished and have deprived ourselves of Hope and Love. If we truly contemplate such a fate, it is not a stretch to compare the depth of despair at such a prospect to the agony of being burned alive.

These are just my thoughts on the matter, I am not a scholar and could very well be wrong.

I know that not everyone here is Catholic so please forgive me for quoting the gentle Catholic scholar (my go-to teacher of all things Christian), Joseph Ratzinger. I am grateful to him for making the incomprehensible comprehensible to someone like me. In very simple terms, he writes in his book, Introduction to Christianity, “Death is absolute loneliness. But the loneliness into which love can no longer advance is — hell.”

Loneliness sounds trivial but it is, in fact, an agony to experience. Many feel this depth of loneliness at Christmastime, I do myself though surrounded by a large family. At heart we are all alone and only God can fill the void. Let us pray for all who suffer loneliness and a sense of abandon during this season, that we will cry out to God, just as Jesus did on the cross, knowing that God will never leave us or forsake us while we have breath in our bodies and love in our hearts for a good savior.

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. John 1:5

Oh Zeke, thank you – I am glad you understand. Yes, that is just it. I don’t see how the prospect of extinction rather than eternal life would be something to just shrug off – how dreadful it is. The prospect of it may well burn the individual, but that is poetic.

I saw, recently, ISIS burn someone alive. Is that really what we think God allows to happen? What definition of ‘God is love’ does that speak to?

Have a merry Christmas Zeke – and I’d better apologise to everyone for posting this now 🙂 xx

Let me take a totally different tack here, my friend. Now God is infinitely higher than mankind as we are to say a protozoa or for illustrations sake a worm. To think of love and compassion for a worm that is writing in pain on a hot rock or drowning in a pool of water does not cause me any concern. I will not lose sleep at night over this. I might, should it strike my fancy take the worm and place it in my yard for the purpose of aerating and fertilizing it. So it is rather a remarkable thing and act of God’s Love to even give us a second chance (an infinite act of love and mercy); like a dog that has bitten its master and given a second chance.

But God did deign to become a man and die on the Cross for love of our spirit souls which are in the image and likeness of Himself: freewill, knowledge of good and evil etc. So what more expression than that do we need.

I do not struggle with God not being love because after affording man many chances to rise above our fallen state, it will not affect the Love which God is nor make of Him a cruel tyrant: no more so than when i take an antibiotic and kill good an bad bugs alike.

The problem with annihilation in this sense is that unlike these lower beings we are not acting as they out of instinct or by chemical programming but by choice. And being made in His image and likeness (possessing an everlasting spirit soul) we know the consequence of our actions. We choose our fates. I only know that if we are in Heaven those in Hell will never even cross our minds. It is hard for us since we think of everything as if we are God’s most precious treasure. My understanding is that it is the Love of Christ by the Father that even gives us this ability to join the Divine Household. – – not because we (ourselves) are so special. When God sees sanctifying grace in our souls He sees His Son and we are loved for Christ’s sake. If not, we are not.

I guess I’d say that we are not like low life forms to God, because, as you remind us, we are made in his image, so we;re not like a bug to him, but we are like children – his children. A parent may not be able to stop their child doing wrong, but they wouldn’t, would they, be OK with the idea of them being tormented for eternity?

I see. My difficulty here is that Jesus seems quite clear we are children by adoption – even when we are far off, we are loved. Stupid and ungrateful children we may be, and we may not see the love – but all we have to do is to stretch out a hand and we find he is there.

And our Church . . . which I trust as the keeper of that which we are told to believe . . . is my crutch. Your sensitivity to love, justice and mercy is to be commended and applauded though it may not reflect the supernatural reality except in a way that is like looking through a dark glass.

That is fine, my friend. We need to ponder the deeper things in life and the wonders of the mysteries before us. So we speculate . . . we reject, we refine, we recalculate and usually we simply return to that which the Church has handed us. 🙂 xx

Yeppers, Jess. You really don’t believe in Hell. I got that. But that doesn’t make it disappear.

You should flesh out your thesis some more. Really put more effort into it. There is some work that could be done on the organization of the actual texts, like could you gather all the OT stuff to one side, then move it on the NT stuff? Back and forth is hard for some readers to grasp. Just my two cents and it is worth every penny you paid for it. There is a market for this kind of thing unfortunately. Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Ginnyfree.

If you got that, you got it from yourself. I said, I think several times, I do. It is what the Hebrews called Sheol. It is where the dead go before the Judgment. After that, those bound for eternal bliss go there, those who are not suffer the ultimate penalty – they are separated by their own will from God forever.

My question is around the version of it you believe, not whether it is there. I have never said it is not there, I have, however, suggested it is not what you say it is. I have provided reasons. I await your doing so.

I am fully convinced that man is not innately immortal and that all created things continue their existence because the Lord upholds their existence. Given this perspective I note that Paul informs us that eternal life is a gift of God and that the wages of sin is death.

If my first premise is correct then the Lord would have to uphold the existence of the unrighteous specifically in order to torture them for an eternity. This is nothing short of a blasphemous view of the nature of God.

If man were innately immortal an ‘eternal conscious torment’ in hell might be a possible reality, although it seems to strongly contradict the outcome for the unrighteous that God has warned of. Secondly if God is omnipotent he could mercifully destroy the unrighteous and remove them from existence. It makes no sense that he would not do just what scripture indicates will take place. If He determined not to do this God’s revealed nature as love is brought into serious question.

Considering God’s justice are we expected to believe that an unending eternity of the most gruesome and painful torture is just punishment for even an entire life of nothing but sin – given the infinitely brief span of our lives by comparison. There is no justice here.

To adequately appreciate and participate in such a discussion it is necessary to be fully conversant with each case in respect of hell and to be able to marshal the (assumed) scriptural basis for each. I used to believe in ‘eternal conscious torment’ and having studied the subject of hell from all perspectives I have dismissed ‘universalism’ as scripturally untenable and have changed my opinions to ‘conditional immortality’. I appreciate that Roman Catholics are not free to make their own determination on this matter no matter whether their sensibilities are revolted by the thought of their church’s opinion or not. The presentation of the beliefs of the RCC are not new to me indeed I teach them as the traditional view.

My concern over the traditional view of hell is with respect to the presentation of the gospel and the nature of God revealed in Christ to those who as yet have made no positive response to Him. The traditional view of hell is one that has caused many to reject the gospel and some to submit to Christ (initially) from nothing but fear.
So how do I proceed as one who works as in evangelism and teaching believers. If the subject of hell becomes an issue, an issue during evangelism it will be the horror of hell and an attitude that rejects a God who could provide such a place. I explain my understanding of ‘Conditional Immortality’ and acknowledge that it has not been the traditional view of the church and that I do not think the case for ‘universalism’ holds water.

When teaching believers I explain all views with reference to scripture and the ways the texts have been interpreted.

Many evangelical churches have members that differ in opinion in the same congregation it is not a doctrine that should divide the fellowship believers but some fundamentalist make it a cause of division.

Of course I might be wrong and if hell were to be an ‘eternal conscious torment’ I remain convinced that God is such that that this is simply the most merciful outcome He could accomplish – even though it would not square with my view of His omnipotence.

I do not follow the Lord from fear but from love and gratitude for all he has done for me.

Rob – that is so beautifully expressed and I agree with it entirely. Do you have any references to ‘conditional immortality’ sources, I’d love to read more here. Like you, I flirted with universalism, but came to the view it is untenable scripturally.

Jess, look up Barth and Cullmann. They should be able to help you find your way. But as for me and my house, we serve the Lord. I cannot recommend you go further down that road, but if you must, pray a Rosary afterwards. Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. God bless. Ginnyfree.

I am familiar with both of them and find them helpful. I pray my Rosary every day 🙂

You have a lovely Christmas and a great New Year, and I hope your knee improves – I think I saw you said you had problems with it. Having spent this year recovering from a debilitating illness, I have a strong empathy with anyone suffering – and have added you to my prayer list 🙂

Jess I do not have any direct access to source material and have not made a written summary of my views which were developed in association with Ichthus Christian Fellowship the church movement we are linked with in the London. I have read papers on the topic from Faith Forster (see below) and from their title was able through Goggle to track down an overview of a book she contributed to – “The Nature of Hell: A Report by the Evangelical Alliance Commission on Unity and Truth Among Evangelicals”. ACUTE, 2000. Faith is the wife of Roger Forster an Ichthus leader and former chair of the EA who did his theological studies at Cambridge. He taught several times on the topic and they have been our primary mentors for many years.

The information below explains the content and context of the book – which arose out of shifting opinions within the membership of the EA. You will see that the influence of John Stott, a prominent evangelical Anglican played a considerable part in this. I think this book would be a good place to start with.

This book is a report written by a working group of the ‘Alliance Commission on Unity and Truth among Evangelicals’ (ACUTE), an organization established by the Evangelical Alliance. The group consists of David Hilborn, Faith Forster, Tony Gray, Philip Johnston, and Tony Lane. The primary purpose of the report is to address the issue of conditionalism, or conditional immortality, along with annihilationism (chapter 5 distinguishes between conditionalism and annihilationism and discusses their relationship). The book was occasioned by tensions over the rising interest in conditionalism and annihilationism among evangelicals, particularly tensions in the history of the EA (see pp. ix-xi, 5-7, 63-67). Among the authors’ recommendations in chapter 10 is that the EA Basis of Faith be revised to include a clause discussing the general resurrection, the final judgment, and heaven and hell. (The Basis of Faith had dropped a reference to “everlasting punishment” in 1970 under the influence of John Stott. In 2005 the Basis of Faith was again revised to include an affirmation of “eternal condemnation to the lost.”)
This book will help readers who are interested in understanding the biblical and theological issues involved in the conditionalism debate. Chapters 6 and 7 provide particularly helpful overviews of the theological and exegetical arguments on both sides, while the survey of views on conditionalism in church history in chapter 4 and the discussion of “background issues” in chapter 2 provide good context to the debate. The authors’ summaries of the arguments on both sides can introduce readers to the issues.

Thank you so much, Rob. I have read something by John Piper, who refers to Stott, but I have not read him, so I shall go there. Dave Smith has given me a good link to some of the Fathers, and C, in his usual unbiased fashion, has given me some references to the APostolic and Early Fathers – and I still have his paperback copy of Athanasius. I think at some point I am going to have to engage with Augustine’s ‘City of God’, but C has given me some other reading to help prepare me for that!

I have dipped into ‘The City of God’ but if I am going to remain the hound of all (well some) things Augustine I think I should also give it thorough work over. Will eternity be long enough? Or was Solomon correct I think he spoke of endless learning.

Very very interesting Rob. I appreciate the opportunity to learn from so many at this blog. On the other hand, I can see why Jesus said we must have faith like a little child to enter heaven, our human minds aren’t able to fully penetrate the truth of heaven or hell. I don’t think it offends God for us to use our minds to think about these things, even Catholics are encouraged to use their brains. 🙂 It makes me think of the practice of Lectio Divina, which I am sure you are familiar with and I believe Pope Benedict encouraged Catholics to use the approach in reading the Bible and letting it speak to them to reveal its truth in a personal encounter with God’s word. I only say this in response to what you said “I appreciate that Roman Catholics are not free to make their own determination on this matter…” While this is true, it is also true that Catholics have a tradition of plumbing the depths of deep theological questions (I know you know this, I have a bad habit of stating the obvious). There is so much more I would like to say, this has been a very interesting discussion for me since I now realize I never gave hell much thought. So, I appreciate you sharing your views, I am starting to “get” what you mean by conditional immortality. I do know that I don’t know the answers to any of this! Just as you say, we are not committed Christians out of fear, it is out of love for the Lord and all he has done in each of our lives. We have reason to trust in his supremacy and his ultimate good and loving justice in all things.

Thanks Zeke for us the task is to run our race with our eyes fixed on Jesus the author and finisher of our faith.

My main concern in considering this matter how the whole question affects those who have not yet become convinced of Christ reality and His love for them – really apart from that I not much bothered which view is taken by my fellow Christians.

I hope you have a great Christmas celebrating Him who it is all about.

Yes, the question of hell is important to me in the same way, I have friends and family who reject faith in a God who they’ve been told burns sinners in hell for all eternity. Our prayer for them is that they will come to the Lord in awe and wonder and not in fear and dread. And isn’t that what the Christmas season is about – awe and wonder! Have a very Merry Christmas Rob.

When I encounter people with a problem over hell, who are prepared to talk it through, I feel duty bound to explain that the traditional majority view was not universally held by the early church Fathers. If you note the quote from ‘C’ you will see a saint and theologian as great as Athanasius, the great defender of the Trinity, taught conditional immortality. If removal of this barrier to their reception of Christ assisted their conversion and commitment to Him the explanation of this would have proved greatly beneficial to them. To explain ‘conditional immortality’ would not require you to compromise your faith or to be in agreement with it.

Hi Jess, I did find this single article that quoted many of the early fathers on this topic which may help you ferret out which ones supported the traditional teaching and those that supported annihilationism or some other form of universalism or conditional eternal life etc. It might be useful to you.

I have had the opportunity for a few more conversations with my atheist doctor friend here which he has initiated and his wife discussed with me the hurt she experienced at church which she has not been able to forgive – I am praying and hoping.

"I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend." J.R.R. Tolkien <br>“I come not from Heaven, but from Essex.” William Morris